


Mercury

by Ladycat



Series: Married [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Schmoop, always a girl Rodney
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 06:21:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1182902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When John's most trusted scientist-watcher sticks his head into the office with eyes as wide as a child's, expression sick-shocky with spots burning high and livid on his cheeks, saying, "Colonel? You should probably go down to the labs," he doesn't bother arguing. He doesn't even bother cleaning up, dropping his pen so that ink spreads dark and damaging over his paperwork.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mercury

Mer is mercurial, quicksilver. Most people call it _hormonal_ , because they forget that she is also stubborn—mules look tractable in comparison—and that her true north is logic, clean and simple. So long as logic is maintained, her stubbornness is mutable, her changes in mood and temperament understandable, even predictable.

She is still a woman, though. She is still _Meredith._

When John's most trusted scientist-watcher sticks his head into the office with eyes as wide as a child's, expression sick-shocky with spots burning high and livid on his cheeks, saying, "Colonel? You should probably go down to the labs," he doesn't bother arguing. He doesn't even bother cleaning up, dropping his pen so that ink spreads dark and damaging over his paperwork.

He doesn't care. Although he really needs to remember to throw out that damn pen and get a new one.

He hears her before he sees her, voice sharpened by ire as it echoes through the hallways. John jogs—can't run, can't let them see his worry—because while Mer has always been mercurial, lately it's more than that. Lately it's _frightening_ , the way she shakes with emotions so powerful she can do no more than gape, wordless and breathless while a vein beats blue and terrifying above her eyes.

Keller swears her blood pressure is normal. Or normal for Mer, anyway, and John believes her.

But now she feels so _much_...

By the time he gets the door open, she's reached that choking, overloaded stage where she can do nothing but make wordless noises that convey nothing of her intent. She looks like an avenging angel, like _Medea_ , hair a wild cloud around her head, verging towards blonde despite the sweat that darkens the roots, a scalding flush dipping below the collar of her lab coat making her eyes so blue, blue like the octane part of a flame, where it burns hottest.

"Clear," he barks, and they obey.

"What the hell are you doing?" she explodes when the lab empties like helium from a balloon. They had been seconds from fleeing without permission, then. "They don't—Miko was—"

Back to wordless again. John sighs, braving fists that have far more power than he expects even now, tucking her against him while she rages into his shoulder. She's going to cry soon, John knows, which always makes her worse. She hates when she cries.

So does John. He has no fucking idea what to do when she cries.

He watches the clock, fingers buried in sweat-heavy hair while she struggles and fights and general acts like she's manic, on rabies, caught in the throws of the most stereotypical for of PMS or some other insulting explanation and this time, John doesn't just brush it off. There is something _mindless_ about her actions, uncontrollable.

And she knows it, he realizes while she puts bruises on his shoulders and gets a good, solid hit to his stomach. That's part of the problem: she's frightened, which always makes her angry.

Which is why she punches him again, his arms steady despite how he wheezes.

"We're going to see Keller," he orders.

"Fuck you," she snaps at him.

And no. No way. No _possible_ way, John thinks, reverting to the awkward half-speak so common in his childhood. No _fucking_ way.

Twenty minutes later, Meredith is in the bathroom peeing on a stick and Keller is giving him a wide-eyed look that makes her look approximately ten years old and too tiny to stand up to a stiff breeze. "I didn't even think to check for that!" she hisses.

John doesn't mention the shots Mer takes, or the way they do try to be safe, because there is something big and golden and untouchable growing inside him. He doesn't know how to handle it, choking words off in his throat, leaving him unable to think anything beyond _maybe_ and _oh god_ and _please._

_Please let this be the answer._

So few things in their lives are simple. This... is. The simplest, most natural thing.

Mer hands off the long, thermometer looking test and slumps against him, head on his shoulder. "I feel like a junky coming off a bender," she mutters, and she does look a little puddled and loose around the edges. John tightens his arms around her: he's border enough. "Also, I hate you. A lot."

"No, you don't."

"Yes, I do. You're _entropy_ , spinning everything out of control and in case you haven't noticed, I _like_ control. My life used to be orderly." Her hand is tight in his, and their wedding bands clink as they brush together.

Keller appears so quickly it’s like magic, impossible because don’t these things take _time?_ , still wide-eyed. "We need to do a blood test," she says, which is confirmation enough.

Meredith sags like a cut string, trusting he'll catch her and limp, so limp, as he presses her against him, mouth against her hair, the golden, glowing part inside of him rising up until he's certain it's leaking out from his skin. "Mer," he says, husky. He swallows, lips wet as he says, “I'll do whatever you want."

Because Meredith McKay has never planned for this, he knows. They don't talk about it, making maybe, future noises whenever it comes up, but he _knows_. Her world is science. That’s her legacy.

But when she pushes off to look at him her eyes are still watery, a little, still ringed with white, but so fierce, so _angry_ that it mutes whatever else he might say. “Don’t ever say that again,” she tells him, too infuriated to be anything but calm, a still pool that hides currents below. “Don’t even _think_ it. And don’t tell me how you could possibly believe that was a good question to ask because I’ll just get mad. Madder. "

He wants to protest because hey, not what he _asked_ except it is. The words might be different, but the intent—the memories, Nancy’s insistence, the frantic tests she tried to hide with wrappers in wastebaskets and one trip to the doctor he found out about later; all false alarms, until John finally realized it was a different alarm-bell ringing—is the same. It’s what he meant and hearing it, seeing it on Mer’s sweaty, flushed face, makes him feel small and humble. Because this isn’t Nancy, inflexible in her desires, her schedules.

This is a woman who takes physics reordering around her with a narrowed glare and a huff of annoyed understanding. This is a woman who discovers other worlds, other realities. She is intuition so profound she doesn’t need to think about it. She just _knows_.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, face hot with shame because dammit, he knows better. “Mer, Mer, I know, I’m _sorry_.”

"Oh, shut up. Fucker," she mutters, and leans in to press her nose against his Adam's apple, lips against the stubble he can't ever truly shave away. They feel wet and familiar. "I want a girl," she whispers. "I want her to be a girl."

John pulls her bodily into his lap, arms around her waist, her ass, squeezing until neither of them can breathe. He wants to laugh, feels it bubbling up inside as Keller works around their tumble to take the confirmation she needs. He wants to tell Mer he loves her, that he’s never known he _could_ love like this, so pure and _real_ , imperfect bumps that make it all the sweeter. Instead he thinks of a tiny face with blue eyes and thick, black hair and says, “Me, too.”


End file.
